The annual Mill City Farmers Market Bread Fest is Saturday, September 30, featuring mini lectures from renowned local bakers and a book signing from Beth Dooley.

MCFM shoppers are encouraged to bring in their own baked products to showcase and share their stories. To enter the showcase, quick breads and yeasted breads are to be dropped off in the train shed demo area by 9:30am that morning. Learn, taste and share your tips with other home bakers and professionals!

Added bonus: All showcase participants will receive a thank you gift from the market, including two complimentary mimosas or cappuccinos from Spoonriver restaurant, a Mill City Farmers Market hat or canvas tote bag, and one 2 1/2 pound bag of heritage flour from Sunrise Flour Mill!

For the Grilled Melon with Market Fruit Agro Dolce, sliced melons were tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper, and seared on the grill.

Aronia berries from Prairie Hollow Farm were the base for the Market Fruit Agro Dolce. Honey, apple cider vinegar and the berries come to a simmer, and then cook for 5 minutes on low heat.

Heather threw out trivia questions during the demo, with each winner taking home a 2017 Chinook Book.

While preparing the Coconut Cream Corn, Heather demonstrated how you might find a worm by the silky end of corn that hasn't been smothered in pesticides. When choosing between cutting away a worm vs. eating chemically-treated corn, I'd take the worm any day!

Coconut Cream Corn is a quick and easy recipe. Coconut milk, fresh corn kernels and salt cook down a bit, then fresh herbs and lime juice are added. For some kick, you can add chili flakes or finely chopped jalapeno.

Below is an article submitted to us by Fast Horse, a local creative agency, regarding the Honeycrisp:

This year’s fast-approaching apple season marks the 20th anniversary of the Honeycrisp — which revolutionized a bland and slumping apple industry, and paved the way for bolder varieties that are piled high in produce aisles today.

Now, the same family-owned orchard in rural Minnesota that made a bold bet on bringing the Honeycrisp to market finds itself on the forefront of industry innovation, once again.

Twenty years ago, annual apple sales in the U.S. were in a slump. Growers were bent on breeding consistent red colors, rather than focusing on flavor, and mainstream varieties were bland and mushy. In fact, Pepin Heights Orchard, like many family farms around the country, found itself on the brink of bankruptcy. But the little-known Midwestern farm made a big bet on Honeycrisp, which offered bolder flavor and innovative texture.

Flash forward, and U.S. apple sales have been on a steady climb. What's more: The price that U.S. growers receive for apples has more than doubled between 1990 and 2015. That's because, on the heels of Honeycrisp's success, more orchards are producing higher-quality products that consumers are willing to pay more for.

The industry transformation was made possible by Pepin Heights owner Dennis Courtier, who worked with David Bedford of the University of Minnesota’s apple breeding program and brought Honeycrisp to the market.

For the September 2 Mill City Cooks demo, Chef Jenny Breen prepared a super tasty Greek Pico de Gallo Chicken Salad, featuring chicken breasts from Braucher's Sunshine Harvest Farm, feta cheese from Cosmic Wheel Creamery and produce from several of the vegetable farmers.

Jenny marinated the chicken in a sauce consisting of Greek yogurt, minced garlic, lemon juice, honey and fresh herbs. From there, the chicken was fried in a few tablespoons of olive oil, with additional marinade added while it cooked thru.

The final step in prepping the chicken was to shred it into bite-sized pieces.

Once the chicken was removed from the pan, fresh sweet corn was seared to bring out extra flavor.

With the chicken and corn ready, the remaining salad ingredients were chopped and everything was combined, along with a Greek yogurt dressing (yogurt, garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, honey and salt) and crumbled feta.

If you’ve ever walked through the Mill City Farmers Market on a Saturday morning, you may notice there is something that distinguishes it from other shopping experiences. Not only do over 120 local farmers and artisans transform the historic train shed overlooking the Mighty Mississippi into a bustling marketplace, but they also create a community. Farmers educate shoppers about this year’s sweet corn harvest (it will be going late into September) and the Alaskan fishing season (Sockeye goals were met!). Local artisans explain their crafts through weaving demonstrations, small-batch sauerkraut samples, bees buzzing in a tableside beehive and even a sourdough starter on display, bubbling away in the morning heat. You will also see neighbors gather to support healthy foods and local farmers.

“From my perspective, [what distinguishes Mill City Farmers Market is] a combination of Brenda's vision for the market, and a customer base that cares about the farmers and vendors,” says long-time Mill City Farmers Market vendor Jeff Nistler of Nistler Farms, who sells organically grown sweet corn, melon, tomatoes and winter greenery from his farm in Maple Plain, MN. “It translates into a desire for education and a desire for the farmers to diversify and experiment. It's not just words; they put their money down to help fund education programs and grants that enable farmers to expand and improve practices. There is no other market that does this.”

The Mill City Farmers Market Grant Program that Nistler mentions started in 2013 as a way for our community to support their farmers in times of crop loss, structural damage and other forms of hardship. It has since grown into a program that not only offers hardship support, but also funds small farmers and food makers working to improve sustainability in their businesses. Nistler, for example, is currently working on a tomato grafting project funded by the Organic Field Grant, in which he aims to reduce viruses in his plants by joining delicious tasting tomatoes onto virus-resistant ones to get the best of both.

Since 2013, the Mill City Farmers Market has awarded almost $67,000 to grantees. The grant program is funded through donations at the market’s annual fundraiser, The Harvest Social, which is coming up on Sunday, September 10th. The event includes and abundant farm-to-table dinner sourced from the market’s vendors, live music, a silent auction and a passionate live auction and Fund-A-Need that directly supports the Market’s grant program.

Moses Momanyi and Lonah Onyancha

Moses Momanyi, a Mill City Farmers Market farmer and grant recipient, will be speaking at the upcoming Harvest Social about the impact the grants have had on his farm. In 2016, Moses and his wife Lonah received a grant to implement an irrigation system on their new 20-acre certified organic vegetable farm, Dawn2Dusk, in Cambridge, MN. The irrigation allowed them to increase the quantity and quality of produce they bring to market every Saturday. A few months later, they also applied for a hardship grant for crop loss due to flooding, ironically. Heavy rains destroyed over $10,000 worth of crops in their fields. While Moses and many other farmers have crop insurance for such events, it rarely covers the full value of the crop. Support from our generous market community makes a huge difference to farms and families in times like these.

In addition to hardship grants, the Organic Field Grant has funded other projects, including: packaging and labeling improvements, trialing new crops and value added products, cool-storage systems, soil improvements, experimenting with new growing techniques and organic certification. The market and its supporters believe that investing in local farmers and food makers through its grant program promotes bio-diversity, reduces pesticide and herbicide use, produces food with greater nutritional content, and benefits the environment. Money spent with local growers and food makers also stays close to home and is reinvested within the community.

Starting this year, the Organic Field Grant is part of the Market’s new Charitable Fund, making all contributions tax-deductible for the first time. The success of the Mill City Farmers Market’s educational programming, grants and food access work over the past eleven years inspired the creation of its new Charitable Fund. Launched as an extension of the successful Mill City Farmers Market, the Charitable Fund shares resources and collaborates with partners to improve community health and well-being.

While the Mill City Farmers Market has been funded by sponsorships and individual donations since its beginning, this new fund will allow the Market to expand the scope, reach and sustainability of its educational and charitable activities.

You can support the Mill City Farmers Market’s Grant Program and Charitable Fund by attending the Harvest Social Benefit on Sunday, September 10th. Enjoy signature cocktails and an abundant farm-to-table dinner prepared by Market Chefs Jenny Breen, Beth Jones and Nettie Colón in the historic Mill City Museum Train Shed. Plus, listen to live music from Orange Mighty Trio and support the market with highly curated silent and live auctions. Purchase your tickets or sponsor a farmer to attend the event by visiting Mill City Farmers Market’s website (http://millcityfarmersmarket.org/support/benefit/).

Per Nettie, don't worry about getting all the silk off the corn, as the mixture will get strained before it goes in the ice cream maker.

For demo purposes, Nettie walked thru all the steps, starting with cooking the milk, cream, corn and white sugar. In real life, the mixture would then be allowed to sit overnight in the refrigerator to assure it's super cold when going in the ice cream maker.

The chilled mixture then gets blended, followed by straining to remove the kernel pieces and any corn silk.

Bonus with this recipe - If you misplace your spoon or spatula, you can use a corn cob to work the mixture thru the sieve!

Finally, the strained mixture goes in the ice cream maker and churns for about 20 minutes.

Nettie displayed the finished product in a dish created by Fringe and Fettle. She sprinkled on three varieties of salts, which add a little color and enhance the overall flavor.

Lucky for the audience, Nettie arrived with a box of samples packed in dry ice. The volunteers each had containers of the three salts on their serving trays so that samplers could enjoy their treats with a little extra flavor of their choosing.

Thank you to Lakewinds Food Co-op for sponsoring the 2017 Mill City Cooks series, and providing fun activities for the little ones (...and adults in the mood for a little coloring!).

Sooo...what is Piri Piri? It's ahotsauceofPortugueseorigin (and/or African, depending on who you ask) made with peppers and spices. The version Nettie demo'd included Aleppo chili flakes, cumin seed, coriander, smoked sweet paprika, salt, sugar, cloves, lemon juice, garlic cloves and red wine vinegar. Per Nettie, Allepo chili flakes are hard to come by locally, but you can find them at Penzeys Spices (and who doesn't enjoy an occasional trip to Penzeys?).

The sauce comes together in a food processor.

Nettie explained how to cut cauliflower steaks into wedges rather than even slices to assure as little breakage as possible during the grilling process.

She also suggested investing in some inexpensive wire trays to keep vegetables from falling thru your grill grate. The cauliflower steaks are drizzled with olive oil and salt and peppered before going on the grill, 8-10 minutes per side, depending on how hot the grill is and how thick the slices are.

The grilled cauliflower was served on a bed of mixed greens and shredded cabbage tossed with sliced carrots, along with a sprinkle of forbidden rice.

Nettie discussed the benefits of forbidden rice. It is a variety said to have disease-fighting antioxidants, as well as dietary fiber, anti-inflammatory properties, and the ability to help stop the development of diabetes, cancer and heart disease.

Once plated, Nettie gave the dishes an extra drizzle of olive oil, and topped them with an edible Nasturtium.

The Tuesday Night Market is open 3:30pm to 7:30pm (the corn give-away is 4p-6p at the Nistler Farms booth, while supplies last). You'll find produce, meat, cheese, baked goods, prepared foods, food trucks, music - not to mention an entire park to relax and play in. The Commons has a huge cart full of games and toys, so the kids won't get bored.

Also at the August 8 Night Market: Farmers Markets of MPLS will be giving away free reusable bags and children’s books near the information booth. Farmers Markets of MPLS is a collaborative of Minneapolis’ 27 farmers markets, fostering the vitality of the City’s farmers markets through strategic and informed innovation, advocacy, education, and cohesive partnerships.